


Where the White Magnolias Grow

by Asterisk



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Abuse, Alternate Universe - No Zombies, Community: twd_kinkmeme, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Rape Aftermath, Trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-25
Updated: 2014-08-02
Packaged: 2018-01-20 17:51:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 8
Words: 19,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1519784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asterisk/pseuds/Asterisk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Following a brutal rape at the hands of a stranger, Beth tries to finish her senior year and make plans for college, all the while dealing with horrific trauma and aftermath. Meanwhile, Daryl, feeling guilty for not stopping Merle in time, takes up a job on the Greene family farm, wanting to make it up to Beth however he can as he deals with his wavering loyalty to his brother.</p><p>Unexpected consequences greet them both, and despite Beth's best efforts to move on and Daryl's efforts to make things better, both find themselves facing difficult choices and making very hard decisions, although luckily neither of them have to do so alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For [this](http://twd-kinkmeme.livejournal.com/5396.html?thread=7517716#t7517716) kink meme prompt.
> 
> I've taken the liberty of aging Beth up to 18, and putting Daryl in his mid-late 20s.

Of all the houses Daryl had ever been in, he’d never felt as out of place as he did in this one. The walls were in good repair, neatly covered in wallpaper with simple designs. The furniture was clean and dusted without anything hanging over it or pushed into piles on the floor. The man interviewing Daryl from across the table was clean-shaven, with his white hair neatly brushed to the side, his clothes pressed, and his shirt neatly tucked into his pants.

He didn’t seem to be bothered by the contrast between the house and Daryl. He kept glancing back at Daryl’s ID in his hands, and then back to Daryl himself, asking questions in an even, steady tone.

“So have you had any experience on a farm before?” Hershel asked.

“Yeah, sure,” Daryl said. “Spent the summer at my uncle’s farm when I was a kid. I helped out around there, did all sorts of work there.” It was a half lie – there had been an uncle and he did have a farm and sometimes Daryl had stayed on it, but he couldn’t really count what he did there as work.

Hershel was plainly looking at him with that _look_ some people wore while they were trying to figure a person out, usually right before they shook their heads and wrote him off. He wasn’t sure what Hershel was seeing, since his expression didn’t give much away, but the anxiety hit him fast and hard: this was an experienced, intelligent old man with great insight, and he could see through him. Now the only thing left to do was for Hershel to find a way to keep his manners as he politely told Daryl that he wasn’t the sort of person he wanted anywhere near his property or his family (and Daryl couldn’t blame him for that).

“Well, Mr. Dixon,” Hershel said after a moment, handing his ID back to him. “You’re a good candidate and you can give a good talk. Whether or not you can follow through with it is a different story.”

Daryl kept his face tight and didn’t react. He’d been expecting this from before he’d walked into the house, and sitting at the dining room table with the early springtime sun coming through the windows just confirmed what he already knew: he was wasting his time.

“But,” Hershel went on, “you seem like a good man, and you’ve convinced me to give you a chance to see if you can walk the walk.”

He smiled at Daryl, who wasn’t sure what to do. The only thing he was sure of right then was that his initial guess about Hershel had been tossed out the window. Perceptive and wise my ass, he thought. If he could convince this guy that he was some sort of ‘good man,’ the sort of person anyone would want working on their property, then this whole gig would be a walk in the park. Was this how con artists felt when they convinced people they were someone that they weren’t, and then got paid for it?

But Daryl would be working. The things he did on his own times mattered just as little as what sort of person he was. As long as he could keep his hands busy and put his head down and work his ass off, it really didn’t matter what sort of stupid, wrong ideas Hershel had about him.

Besides, the job itself was only part of the reason why he’d applied.

With the interview finished, Hershel got himself up from the table. Daryl followed. “There are some others who work here,” he was saying. “The foreman, Otis, isn’t around this week, but you’ll be answering to him.”

Daryl set his jaw as he followed Hershel in to the main room. He was only half paying attention to what the other man was saying. It was something about the people he’d be working with, a list of names or something, and that he had a few forms he needed to fill out and bring back with him, and yes, he could do that.

The rest of his attention was on one of the walls – more specifically, the pictures on it. There were a few wedding photos, and a few that looked older, probably from when Hershel had been a young man.

What caught his eye was the school portrait of a young blond girl with a bright smile and bright face and bright, blue-grey eyes. A twinge of guilt passed through his gut and he cringed, suddenly not sure why he thought he had any place coming here to begin with.

“That’s my youngest daughter,” Hershel said. “Her name’s Beth.”

Daryl nodded. “She live here?” he asked. He glanced over at Hershel, who was looking at him rather than Beth’s picture. It was an accusing look, probably the harshest, most intense look anyone had ever given him. For a moment Daryl was sure the man knew and he almost confessed right there –

_It was my brother, I was there, he raped your daughter, and I didn’t stop him._

Hershel stepped up next to Daryl and looked at his daughter’s picture with a smile. “She’s in school now,” he said. “Next year she’ll be going off to college, and then it’ll just be me and my wife, but once summer comes, she’ll be helping out with the workload around here.”

“Will she?” Daryl asked. He couldn’t imagine the skinny girl in the picture doing any hard labor. It seemed impossible. Then again, the only time he’d seen her had been when she was up against his brother, and he couldn’t even go against Merle without getting the ever-loving shit beat out of him.

“I have two other kids, Maggie and Shawn,” he continued. “Shawn will be coming home from college for a while, and so will Maggie. That’ll be in about two months.”

“I know when college lets out,” Daryl snapped.

Hershel looked at him curiously for a moment, before continuing. “They’ll be working here, too, so that’ll be some more help.”

Daryl nodded. “Yeah, alright.”

“You can come back later this week,” Hershel said. “See if you can put your money where your mouth is. Bring those forms with you.”

Once the final details of Daryl’s employment were arranged and sorted, Daryl left the old Victorian house and went out to where he’d parked his bike on the Greene family’s driveway. From outside the house looked even grander. It wasn’t like anywhere he’d worked before, but he wouldn’t be working in there – he’d be out in the fields, farming and wrangling animals.

Beth walked down the driveway while Daryl was sitting on his bike and zipping up his jacket. She stopped when she noticed him, startled to see anyone was at the house, but eventually she felt her heart beating again and forced herself to keep walking back to the house, right past his line of vision. 

It was her. It fucking was.

She didn’t look as lively as she had in that picture. Her schoolbag was drawn right up to her side and her jacket was wrapped tightly around her, just like her arms were.

Daryl wasn’t sure why, but he’d expected to see blood and bruises. There weren’t any. The attack happened a month ago and it took less time than that for bruises to fade, but her skin was so light and soft that he’d expected something to still be there. It seemed wrong for injuries like what Merle had done to her to just fade and disappear, like nothing had even happened.

But it was her. Beth Greene.

It looked like she didn’t recognize him. For a moment, he was relieved. Then he felt guilty. She had the right to know.

Again, Daryl found himself wondering what he thought he was doing by coming here.

  
****

\--

The Dixon brothers were crashing in a spare room at a friend’s house. More specifically, Merle’s friend’s house, if Tim could really be considered a friend. During the day, Tim was out, leaving the Dixons alone in the house.

Merle was passed out on the couch of Tim’s place. Daryl saw through the front window as he walked up the porch, and he wasn’t all that surprised when his banging on the door got no response from his brother. The door was locked and wasn’t going to give, so after giving the thing one final, angry kick, Daryl stormed around to the back of the house and climbed through the flimsy screen door.

“You know how embarrassing it is to see you passed out like this?” Daryl murmured as he passed his unconscious brother, sprawled out on the couch.

It had been late last night when Merle and Tim got back, crashing in through the front door and thumping around in the kitchen. What a night it sounded like they’d have, and the thought made him sick with a familiar form of dread and anxiety twisting through him as his mind danced around all the possibilities of what it was that Merle could have done, now with definite proof that there weren’t any limits to his depravity. Sometime during the night Merle had passed out, and sometime after that, Daryl did the same from the relative safety of the other room.

Looking at him now, all Daryl could think of was just how pathetic his brother was. It was mid-afternoon and Merle was passed out, fly undone and pants slipping over his hips. His mouth was open and spit was dribbling down his face onto the sofa – not even his own sofa, the one they were just crashing on. There were bruises left along the left of Merle’s face and the faintest shadow of finger-shaped bruises on Merle’s neck, and the backs of his hands were bruised and split open at the knuckle.

Merle was pathetic, and there was no way around it, but Daryl knew he couldn’t talk. He was in the exact same situation as his brother, drifting from place to place and crashing with shitty people because there wasn’t anywhere else he could go.

Daryl heated the stovetop and poured a can of soup into the cleanest saucepan he could find, then lit up a cigarette while he waited for his food to warm up. Every so often he glanced over at Merle, and out the front window into the street, keeping an eye out for Tim. He had no idea when the guy would be back or how many people he’d be bringing with him, so Daryl was quite alright with just grabbing his food and fucking off to the side room that had been left for him and Merle. There was a shitty old TV in there and a flimsy old mattress that just smelled old and boxes of whatever shit Tim had shoved in there. Maybe there were some books or something. Daryl was already resigned to have the most thrilling evening ever, but it was better than being caught out in the middle of the house when this guy got back, especially since Daryl had no way of knowing what would happen tonight.

The soup started boiling. Daryl reached into the cupboard to pull out a bowl. As soon as the door opened, one of the only bowls stacked in there came tumbling out and crashed to the floor.

“God fucking damn it,” he cursed, swearing as he kicked the shards of ceramic over to the corner of the already filthy floor. He wasn’t sure how many bowls were left or whether or not Tim would even notice, but honestly – fuck that guy, bowls don’t go flying unless someone can’t put them away right.

Merle was stirring on the couch and poked his head up just as Daryl gathered the big pieces off the floor and was looking to find another bowl.

“What was that?” he started as he sat up, then saw it was just his little brother moving around in the kitchen. “You’re back.”

“I got the job,” Daryl said.

“Did you, now?” Merle asked. He let out a bit of a laugh as he got comfortable on the couch again, wiping spit off his chin and leaning his head back to comfortably stare at the ceiling. “How long are you going to keep this one for?”

Daryl’s head shot up and he glared over at Merle, then looked back down at his soup. He finished pouring it, grabbed a spoon and tried to wipe the crusty, dried sauce off it. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know what it means, brother,” Merle said. “So how ‘bout you give me an answer?”

“Fuck off, Merle,” he grunted. It was weak.

“I give you a month,” his brother went on. “Maybe a month and a half, if you suck the right dicks.”

Daryl walked through the living room to kick the door to the extra room open. No arguments rose to the back of his mouth, no protests rested at the tip of his tongue. Everything was swallowed back down. His mouth felt dry. He kept his head down and stared at the soup and tried to get angry at that explicit comment rather than acknowledge that Merle had a point, and that he was right.

He was no better than his big brother, after all.

 _What are you even trying to do here?_ he sneered at himself.

“Where do you even think you’re trying to go with this, anyway?” Merle asked.

Daryl lips twitched. “Just giving it a shot,” he said. It was a defensive answer from backed into a corner without an answer to give to anyone, Merle or himself.

This wasn’t just about having a paying job, after all. The thought didn’t help him any.

Merle didn’t say anything else, so Daryl pushed the door open and sat himself down on the flimsy old mattress, ready to wait it out in there until he knew what the atmosphere in the house would be like for the rest of the night.


	2. Chapter 2

Hershel was filing a handful of papers away in his desk when Beth came in. She set the mail on the front table, slipped her shoes off, and carried them upstairs as she made her way to her room. 

“How was school?” Hershel asked her as he walked into the front room from his office. 

She stopped with her foot on the stairs and turned. “It was alright,” she said noncommittally.

It was awful. First period started with her chemistry teacher handing back a test with a stern face and a “you were doing so well, too.” She hadn’t even done poorly, she’d flat out failed. No one at home had even known she’d had the test, and that was probably for the best. By lunch she was reminded of an English essay due the next day, and the only thing she had going for her was that she’d actually done the reading on time.

Maybe she could’ve done some work during lunch – she hadn’t had time to make lunch that morning and didn’t have the money to buy anything – but she sat with her boyfriend and a few other friends instead. She’d never realized how tiring the fun lunchtime conversations were until she didn’t want to have them anymore, but the last thing she wanted was for anyone to think she was becoming withdrawn, or that there was something _wrong_ with her. She was getting enough worried looks at home peppered with the subtle questions of whether or not there was anything wrong with her and the unspoken promises to listen if she wanted to talk that hung in the hair.

The thought of admitting that maybe something had happened, that maybe this was too much and she needed time to collect herself, was horrible. What had happened had happened to her, and it was her job to deal with it. There wasn’t anything to do other than get on with things, after all. The last thing she needed was to be getting that from her friends, too.

By the time she got home, she was exhausted. An unhealthy mix of stress of lack of sleep.

“Are you alright, Beth?” her dad asked, proving her earlier point.

“Yeah, of course I am,” she automatically said. “Why?”

“You seem distracted,” he said. The fatherly concern was thick in his voice. “Are you sure everything’s alright?”

Her throat tightened. The option to tell him was, and while there would never be a good time to tell him, this was as good a time as any. It was one of the many, constant arguments she’d had with herself over the past month. The certainty that she had around her friends that she would keep this to herself and move on began to crumble. This was her father, after all, and he loved her. Everything he’d done since she was born had been with his family’s best interest in mind, and this would be no different.

Her confidence in herself to do this alone wavered, and the words _there is something so terribly wrong, I can’t, I need your help_ pushed at the inside of her lips.

The explanation that would follow was even heavier, a hard weight lodged in her stomach that weighed the other words down. How could she ever bring herself to say anything so horrible?

She pursed her lips together. “I’m fine,” she said coolly. “It was a hard day today, and I forgot I had an essay due tomorrow. That’s all.”

Hershel slowly nodded. “Well, alright then,” he said. “You should get to work on that essay, then. Is there anything I can do to help you?”

Beth shook her head. “No, Daddy,” she answered. “I just need to force myself to get through it. I should go do that, shouldn’t I? Call me if you need any help with dinner.”

With that, she trotted upstairs and to her room, clicking the door shut behind her. Her bedroom wasn’t small, but with the furniture spread out and cork boards and posters lining the walls, it felt closed and cozy, something she needed and couldn’t find anywhere else in the house.

Beth dropped her shoes next to the door and then splayed herself over the bed with her bookbag. She was exhausted. These were the last months of her senior year, and everyone who’d told her how easy the final stretch of high school was _lied_.

It was going to be a long night. She’d probably have to make herself some coffee just to stay awake – she was already dead on her feet, and couldn’t even remember the last time she’d felt well rested. It was better if she started her work right away and got at least the rough draft of her essay written before dinner. She had to get to work.

Beth set her laptop up on her bed and pulled out the book she needed, paging through for the place she needed so she could get started.

She didn’t get much further than that.

\--

Three hours later, just as it started to approach seven, Annette sent Hershel to call Beth for dinner. He called from the bottom of the stairs, and when she didn’t respond, he walked himself up to her room.

Her door was shut. He gave two sharp knocks on the door and waited for a response.

“Beth?” he called. There was no answer. After giving a few more knocks and getting no response, he pushed the door open and looked inside.

His youngest daughter was laying on her bed with the book open on her chest and her knees hanging over the edge. Her laptop sat on the pillow with the pink and yellow bubbles of her screensaver bouncing around her screen.

As she slept, her eyebrows furrowed and her lips moved, alternating between quickly mouthing something he couldn’t make out and biting her lower lip.

“Beth?” he asked.

He was halfway to her bed to shake her awake when she bolted upright with a strangled scream that never quite left her mouth in full. She leaned over on her knees and wrapped her fists tightly around the comforter, shaking as she tried to right herself.

Hershel was at her side in a moment, just in time for her to snap her head up and glare at him with those bright grey eyes. They stared at each other for a moment without moving until Beth finally forced chest and arms to relax.

“It was a nightmare,” she quietly said. “I’m sorry if I worried you.”

“It’s alright,” he said. “I didn’t expect you to be asleep, though.”

“I just got tired,” she said. “I haven’t been sleeping well recently… it’s probably just stress, I guess.”

Hershel nodded and sat next to her on the bed. She moved over so he could without having to touch her. “I know,” he said. “You’ve been under a lot of pressure, haven’t you?”

She nodded and didn’t meet his eyes. Carefully, Hershel pressed, “What’s worrying you?”

Beth wasn’t sure what to say right then. She was tired. Eventually, she settled on an answer, “I got a test back today,” she said. “… I didn’t do very well.”

“Is it something I can help you with?”

“It was chemistry,” she said.

“I can give you a hand with that if you need,” he said. “I was pretty good, back in the day. Would you like that?”

Beth nodded. “Thank you.”

“It’s dinnertime right now, though,” he said as he stood back up. He put his hand on her shoulder and gave it a tight squeeze. “You wash yourself up and come meet me and your mom downstairs for dinner.”

She smiled at him and nodded, and as soon as he left she let out a deep sigh. She wasn’t sure if it was from relief or not. Her heart was still kicked into fifth gear and the anxiety sure wasn’t leaving her, but once he left it felt like she had room to finally catch her breath.

Food was the last thing she wanted. Nevermind that she hadn’t had anything to eat since dinner the night before – the leftover adrenaline was still running through her and all she felt was nausea and the need for a long, boiling bath to unknot all her muscles. Her chest ached, and so did arms and legs. Beth couldn’t tell what pain was from tensely sitting all day and what was the leftover nightmare physically lingering in her bones. Things hurt, and the pain itself was reminiscent of the pain (memories) that hovered just outside her conscious thoughts, threatening to force their way inside of her – inside of her head – if she lingered on it too much.

“No,” she said, firmly shaking her head and standing up. “I’m not going to think about this right now.”

It was time for dinner regardless of if she was hungry or not, and she hadn’t eaten all day. There were just too many things that she needed to get done before the end of the night, and she didn’t have time to mull this over in her head right now, or ever.

\--

It was almost midnight when she got a text message from Jimmy, looked down at her phone, and sighed.

After dinner she moved her laptop over to her desk, where she typed up an essay plan and then got to work on the rough draft. It was almost finished, and all she had left to do was write the introduction and conclusion and add in a few quotes. It was a lot of work for an English essay, but it had been over a month since she’d turned in anything good for any of her classes, and she was determined to make sure that this essay was better than just barely scraping by.

She switched her phone on and read the text.

*ill be over in 15*

She looked out the window, almost expecting to see her boyfriend pulling into the driveway. He wasn’t, of course.

*What are you doing?*

*just wanna see you. it’s been a while since we just hung out. i’m worried about you.*

She frowned slightly at the last bit, but couldn’t deny that it was sweet of him to worry. Jimmy had been a friend of hers for a long time, even though they’d only been dating for about 8 months. Of course he’d notice, and of course he’d be worried.

*I’m busy with an essay.*

*break?*

Beth bit the end of her nail and thought. It would be easy to finish the rough draft of the essay before he got there. Both her parents were sound asleep – she’d heard her mom going up earlier, and her dad followed shortly after. They’d both be out instantly, so she could leave the house to meet with Jimmy.

Besides, it’d be nice to spend some time with him – they’d hardly talked outside of school for a while now, and she missed spending time with him.

(She wasn’t going to become a recluse. There wasn’t anything to do beyond moving on, and clearly she wasn’t doing a very good job of it if everyone around her was noticing.)

*Yeah, alright.* She left the “I guess” off. There wouldn’t be any second guessing herself tonight, she firmly decided. Not now. Jimmy was important to her, and she cared about him. She trusted him.

Twenty minutes later Jimmy texted her saying that he was at the top of her driveway. Beth was just short the final sentence of her conclusion, which she quickly typed out with half-hearted enthusiasm and a dash of impatience before grabbing her jacket and running out to meet Jimmy in the cool, spring night.

“You are crazy,” she said to him as she walked out to the side of his pickup. He was in the front seat with the window open, the engine still running, and the headlights on. Their many secret meetings over the past few months taught them not to bring the pickup right to the front of the house – it was an old thing his dad gave him and the engine – among its many traits, good and bad, – was loud.

“I guess I am,” he said. “Crazy about you.”

“Oh my god,” Beth said with a giggle. He killed the motor and got out, then led her around to the back of the back of the pickup, hopped up, and offered her a hand.

Her breath hitched in her throat and she looked up at him. This was far from the first time they’d sat together like this, and what she remembered of all those times came back in a flood.

A month ago she’d have blushed a deep, dark red, but now she paled at the memories of the things they’d done in the back of his truck – how his mouth kissed hers, gently at first, and then stronger with passion, with his hands wrapped around hers and then on her arms, holding her shoulders and wrapped around the small of her back, pulling her closer to him. He’d been warm, and his skin had been gentle against hers (and she knew that), but the thought of having anyone’s hands on her made her skin crawl, even if it would be the same as how he’d traced the skin on her back and sides, slipped his fingers up her shirt and down her pants, held her hips –

_– just like a fist with fingers like nails digging into the bones, drilling themselves through her skin and burying inside her, leaving dark, hand shaped bruises on her sides and tiny, bleeding red welts –_

“Hey, are you alright?”

He looked concerned. Beth nodded. “I’m fine,” she said. Her jaw hurt.

Jimmy took her hand and helped her up on the back. They both took a seat and tried to get as comfortable as they could.

It was dark out. In the country, with minimal light pollution, she could easily look up at the stars in the sky. It was a sight she sometimes took for granted since she could just look out the window and see the starlight pouring in on her. The first time Jimmy drove out to see her, she’d giggled and climbed in the back with him, much like what she was doing now, and they lay there together, staring right up at the sky and really looking at them for the first time in years.

Tonight was cloudy. She could only see the moon and stars between the waves of clouds passing in front of the light.

“It’s been a while since we did anything like this,” Jimmy said. He looked at her with bright eyes that jumped between every corner of her face as if he’d never seen her before and never would again.

“Has it?” she asked.

He nodded. “You’ve been busy.”

“I guess I have been,” she said. “School’s been kicking my butt this year.”

“Tell me about it,” Jimmy mumbled. “Can’t wait to be done with it.”

They sat quietly for a while. It was chilly enough that even with her jacket on, she felt the bite and was shivering. The ridges on the back of the pickup pressed up into her butt and she shifted around uncomfortably. Jimmy seemed to be having just as much fun as she was. It wasn’t this bad before when they’d been laying together in the back for hours before she’d eventually slip back into the house after a kiss.

When he put a hand on her leg she startled. All the muscles in her body froze, and she stared at him.

He looked hurt by that response.

“I’m sorry,” she said quietly.

“You really are great, you know that?” he said. “I know you’ve been busy recently and that there’s been a lot on your mind, but that’s fine, alright? I’ll be here.”

Beth nodded. She reached down and took his hand off her leg, wrapping her fingers around his own. “You know I appreciate that, right?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I know.”

She couldn’t help the tenseness that crept into her shoulders and arms. She kept his hand wrapped in an iron grip and held her knees together as tightly as they could until the bones were running on each other.

“Are you cold?” he asked.

“It’s a bit chilly.”

“Here,” he said, leaning forward and putting one of his arms around her. She shivered into the touch as his arm closed around her and squeezed. He was warm, and she wasn’t. His body heat meant the nervous, humming heat from her nerves that spread down through her limbs. Everything felt heavy.

When he kissed her she didn’t say anything. He moved his arms around her shoulders and she put her arms on his so her arms were squished and held immobile between the two of them. Her lips parted and she let his tongue touch her. He kissed down the side of her face and held her tighter –

– tight enough that she couldn’t move –

– _she couldn’t move_ –

– and then he was moving down to her neck, gently sucking on the skin at the back, where she could cover the bruising with her hair if she kept it down. She balled her hands up into fists and caught the denim right in her hands. It didn’t bunch up, and her hands tired from trying.

When he leaned her back, she whimpered. Something caught in her throat and it choked her – she couldn’t breathe. Her chest ached, just like then, when she was on her back and he was on top of her – him, not Jimmy – and she couldn’t breathe for how much it hurt and how tight her chest had felt – just like now, and this is Jimmy on top of her and with his arms wrapped so tightly around her that she couldn’t move her arms or even breathe anymore.

Her head turned to the side and she stopped looking at him. All she could do was lie there, frozen with her mouth hanging open and not a muscle in her body responding how she wanted to be. 

Jimmy stopped what he was doing. “Beth? Beth!” he called. “Are you alright?”

She nodded and rolled away from him. There needed space. It was too exposed out here. She still couldn’t breathed. She pulled herself onto her feet despite how badly her knees trembled as they held the weight.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” she managed to say. “I’m sorry, I really am, I just – I have to go.” She looked at him with hopelessly wide eyes, looking for some sort of reactions. She could still feel her boyfriend’s hands on her, just like if they’d been under her skin.

He slowly rose to his feet and took a step forward. Instinctively, she recoiled and took a step away from him. Later she’d remember the look on his face – hurt and shock and confusion, and above all, concern. For now, though, all that she was registering was a body coming closer to grab her (no, that wasn’t Jimmy who did that) and how open her surroundings were. She wasn’t seeing Jimmy anymore, but _him_.

“Did I do something?” he asked. “Beth, did I hurt you?”

She shook her head. “No, it’s not you,” she said. “Look, I’m sorry, really, but I have to go.” She was already jumping off the pickup truck and backing away from it, trying to put as much space between herself and him she could. What she would do to be in her room again, tightly wrapped up with the covers pulled around her.

Jimmy watched her as she started walking away. She wasn’t waiting for him to say anything, but he did anyway. “Do you want me to walk you in?”

“No,” she said again. “Just… I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She looked up at him helplessly. Staying here any longer was impossible. She needed to be by herself, alone.

“That’s fine,” Jimmy said flatly. “I’ll see you around.”

A jerking nod, and then she turned and ran back to her house.

The breath that had choked her came out in heaves and she could barely stand for how badly she was shaking. She stumbled to back up to her room, and at the last moment she stopped and turned into the bathroom just in time for her to break down wretching into the toilet, the feeling of shame creeping up her spine.


	3. Chapter 3

On his first day of work, Daryl arrived with a blackened left eye and bruises shadowing the underside of his jaw.

Tim had been awake when he’d left the house that morning. He hadn’t said anything, but when did he ever? The silence that morning sure wasn’t from anything like _guilt_ about how he’d punched Daryl so hard his vision blurred and slammed him onto the floor until he’d seen stars.

Merle still wasn’t back from wherever he’d fucked off to the night before. Daryl wasn’t sure what he’d do if he still wasn’t back by the time he got off of work.

It was with these thoughts that he pulled up to the Greene farm and dismounted his bike. He kicked the stand down and dropped his jacket onto the seat, then headed off to the barn where he was told to go when he started work.

There were about four people standing at the front of the barn, seemingly waiting for him to show up. Out of all of them, Daryl only recognized Otis from when he’d stopped by the day before to get a tour of the place and be briefed on what his job would be. He’d been asked about what experience he’d had on a farm before, and did he know how to handle machinery, and was he willing to learn? Yes, of course he was.

They stopped talking when he walked up.

“Nice shiner,” the youngest guy said.

At best he was twenty. Age had barely touched him and his little baby face and freckled arms that didn’t look like they had any meat on them. If Daryl had seen him anywhere else he wouldn’t have guessed the guy had it in him to be doing anything resembling hard labor. Even with his faded work jeans and t-shirt, he looked too scrubbed up and clean cut to have ever had to do anything outside the house.

Last Daryl checked, little guys weren’t the ones who had any position to be sizing anyone up, least of all a bigger guy who could put some force behind his punch.

“Thanks,” he grunted.

Little guy rolled his eyes and let out a snort. 

The only woman out there gave Otis a look, one that Daryl had seen enough times to recognize: _Why are you taking_ this guy _on board_? He’d heard it before and hadn’t expected much else; regardless of the kind of work he got himself, everyone else would always have one step up on him and be in a position to judge, and they always would.

Sometimes he wondered why he didn’t just prove them right. His bruised face was all the confirmation anyone needed to confirm their ideas of him, and for the rest of his time there nothing would convince anyone differently.

It would be too easy to put his fist through that kid’s teeth. Judge that, you little prick.

“This is Daryl,” Otis said. “He’s not got as much experience on a farm as the rest of you, so keep an eye out for him.”

“Great,” the woman said. Her eyes were on Daryl as she said it.

And so began Daryl’s first day on the farm. Once they got working, everyone seemed to have forgotten there was even a new member on the team. They all fell right in line to get down and dirty, and each of them could carry their own weight. The work wasn’t easy or anything like what Daryl had done before, but he caught on quickly enough and was more than willing to put his head down and get to it. No one had much to say to him beyond that.

By the time noon rolled around and they all broke for lunch, Daryl had worked up quite a sweat and an appetite to match. He noticed the group heading back to the house and inconspicuously headed back to his bike to grab the can of beans and roll of bread he’d snagged from Tim’s cupboard, then headed off to find a tree to sit under.

He had a good enough view of the house. The others were sitting out on the porch, and every so often he saw Beth come out to put something on the table, along with another woman he couldn’t recognize from where he sat.

Daryl wasn’t thinking too much of it until she left the porch and crossed over to where he sat. Subconsciously he sat up a bit, straightening out his back and picking the can of beans off the ground.

“So you’re the new farmhand,” she said as she approached. Up close, he recognized her from the pictures he’d seen hanging on the wall. Age had treated her better than it had her husband, with only on few wrinkles around her mouth and eyes and a mere handful of grey hairs creeping into the long brown locks falling around her shoulders. When she looked at him, it wasn’t with condemnation, just observation.

“Yeah, that’s me,” he said.

Her eyes lingered on his black eye. He hadn’t done too badly for himself the night before; as bad as it must have looked, he gave as good as he got. By the time he’d gotten a hold of himself and was no longer seeing double, Merle and a good few guys had fucked off and the people who hadn’t were at various stages of passing out around the house.

“I’m Annette.” She leaned over and extended a hand.

Both Daryl’s hands held something. He took the roll in his mouth, then, with his free hand, reached over and shook it. “Daryl,” he said around the bread. He let go and took the bread back again. “Daryl,” he repeated once his mouth wasn’t full.

“Daryl,” she repeated. “It’s nice to meet you.” Annette straightened herself up back to full height.

Daryl nodded and stayed silent.

“Are you alright?” she asked. When he looked at her strangely she touched her own face.

“I’m fine,” he said. “It doesn’t hurt or nothing. Should be fine in a few days.”

Annette nodded strangely at him. He wasn’t sure why she asked, so he went with his safest bet: she wanted reassurance that he was fine, and by extension, everything around her was fine and there wouldn’t be any trouble for her or her farm.

“If you say so,” she said. “You know the others take their lunch with us on the porch, right?”

There they were, all buddy-buddy.

“I saw them,” he told her.

“You can join us all up there if you want,” she said. She looked at what he had with for lunch. “No need to be shy, now.”

“I’m fine,” Daryl said. He held up the can of beans and the roll to show her.

“Well, that’s your choice. The offer’s available as long as you work here,” she said. “Anyway, I’d better get back to help my daughter with lunch.”

“Is she alright?” Daryl asked.

Annette stopped for a moment. “She’s just fine,” she said. “Is there a reason you ask?”

Daryl shook his head. “No,” he quickly said. “Just asking.”

“Well, we’re all fine,” she told him. When he didn’t say anything else, she turned and walked back to the house, leaving Daryl to finish eating by himself.

Annette hadn’t seen any reason to mention that Beth had been home sick a few days earlier. She was just fine now, though.

At least, physically she was.

If Beth thought Annette hadn’t noticed the subtle changes in her daughter’s behaviour, she was wrong. There were some things a mother noticed, and a father, too – over the past months she’d spent many nights exchanging worries and vague concerns with Hershel about their youngest child. Every time one of them tried to breach the subject, they’d hit a wall. There was always an excuse, and it was always a valid one. Beth was tired, and stressed about school. She was worrying about college, or she ate something that disagreed with her. No matter what they asked or how many times they tried, they got nothing, and concern grew.

But Annette knew. She could tell. And if anyone asked, she could point to the day when the overwhelming darkness had settled over the house.

She and Hershel had been out that night. It had been years since they’d last done anything special, so when a friend showed them a good offer at a nice hotel for a whole weekend, they were quick to accept.

It had been a lovely weekend.

They’d left Beth alone for the weekend. She was a good girl. The worst they had to worry about was that she’d have a few friends over, maybe even her boyfriend. They’d expected this, and had given her permission.

The worst either of them expected was to come home to a few dirty dishes and a bit of a mess.

There had been none of that. When Annette walked in, bags dragging behind her while Hershel parked the car. The dishes were clean and the counters were wiped down, and as far as she could see nothing was out of place.

Her house was filled win a deep and overbearing sense of wrongness that permeated into the corners of her house. She’d never realized how big the house was. Even when she’d found herself home alone, it had never seemed that overbearing.

“Beth?” Annette had called. Her voice was lost in the empty rooms.

Her daughter wasn’t there. The house had devoured Beth and would swallow herself and Hershel.

But Beth came downstairs. Her hair was damp and clinging to her shoulders, and it looked like she’d spent the night wearing the clothes. She looked fine. Normal.

“How was your weekend?” Annette asked.

Beth tilted her head and for a long moment, she just looked at her. She looked lost.

At just that moment, Hershel came in and whatever Annette felt settled. “How was it, Beth?”

“I’ve been fine,” she said. The momentary confusion left her face and she smiled at her parents. “How was your trip?”

Just like that, life resumed at the same frequency that she left. Annette was home, and things were back to normal. Beth helped bring their bags inside and up to their rooms, and they gave her the box of chocolates they picked up for her and told her about their weekend.

They carried on as usual. Things returned to normal, and any new oddness in Beth’s behaviour wasn’t that odd; everything had an explanation, after all.

But Annette knew. She wasn’t sure what happened, but she could see it in everything Beth did. It was in the way Beth hovered outside the rooms she was in, and in how she kept herself locked away in her room, shutting herself in and keeping everyone out. Her jaw was set and her lips worked hard to hold back her tongue. She had something she wanted to say to someone, and she couldn’t bring herself to speak of it. Even now, with a kitchen full of cooking food and a group of people spread across the porch, it was clear: there was something following her daughter like menacing shadow, waiting to devour her.

One day her daughter would come to her. When that happened, she’d be waiting and ready with open arms.

\--

After lunch the farmhands met up to go back out for the afternoon. Beth watched as they gathered themselves together and met up with the new worker who ate lunch by himself. He walked a few steps to the side as they headed back to work.

As soon as she finished cleaning up the kitchen, Beth excused herself and headed to the bathroom.

She still hadn’t had her period this month. It was already a month late.

A few years ago she’d missed a period once. Maggie had told her it happened sometimes, just too much stress and sickness.

She was definitely under a lot of stress recently. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a good night’s sleep, and all the work she still had left was burying her. Just earlier this week she’d had to stay home after she was found curled around the toilet following Jimmy’s visit. It gave her an extra day to finish her essay, but beyond that it didn’t do any favors for her workload. The next day she woke up and didn’t want to. The more she thought about it, the less she ever wanted to leave the house again, especially now.

Beth ran back to her room before her mom had a chance to see her standing outside the bathroom with nerves clawing at her chest.

It would be fine. It was just stress fucking with her body.

_Who are you kidding, Beth?_

There wasn’t much question of what she had to do. Her period was a week late, and since the last one she’d had unprotected sexual intercourse. She had every reason to worry.

She couldn’t ask anyone in her family, nor could she go to any of her friends. She’d never been with Jimmy, and if she came to one of them asking for help getting a pregnancy test, people would talk.

It wasn’t often that she wished she lived in the town, but at least if that was the case she could just slip away in the middle of the night to go to the pharmacy.

The answer hit her a few hours later as she sat at her laptop with the conundrum she’d let herself get dragged into festering in her head.

That new farmhand – Daryl? – wasn’t close to anyone who knew her. She had a bit of money saved away, and she was sure she could pay him in exchange for his help and silence. 

It was probably the worst plan she’d ever had. There were so many ways it could go wrong – nothing was really stopping him from ratting her out to her parents if those were the kind of morals he had, that little girls shouldn’t be sneaking around fucking when they were still kids themselves (as if that was what had happened.) She didn’t know him and couldn’t trust him, and there was nothing that would really stop him from hurting her.

It was the best plan she had, and this was too urgent to let herself get talked out of by nerves and common sense.


	4. Chapter 4

For nearly an hour Beth sat on the steps of her front porch, book in her laps and gaze fixed intently on the barn. It wouldn’t be long for the farmworkers to finish and head off, and then she’d have a chance to talk to Daryl by himself.

Eventually she saw them straggle towards the barn to return any machinery and put the horses they’d brought with them away. After about twenty minutes in there, most started heading back across the front lawn to their cars. A few waved at her when they saw her, and being the polite girl she was, she waved back. Otis strayed away from the rest of them and walked into the house, giving her a kind smile on his way up the stairs.

She looked back to the yard and over to the people saying goodbye as they each dispersed and went to their separate cars.

Daryl was not among them.

She waited a moment longer to see if he was coming. When he wasn’t, she hesitantly stood. With the book tucked under her arm and a wad of all the money she’d been saving since Christmas tucked firmly in her back pocket, she strode across the field.

_Remember why you’re doing this_ , she reminded herself. The reasons were countless, and each one propelled her another step forward until finally she was at the door of the barn.

Through the door she could hear patches of talking intermingling with the snorts and whinnies of the horses. She pushed the door to the barn opened and looked in. There was Daryl at the far end of the barn facing away from her.

“I can hear you, no need to scream at me,” he was saying as she stepped in. “Just talk slower. It wouldn’t kill you.”

Daryl heard the barn door open and glanced over his shoulder. His eyes narrowed slightly in her direction as he gave her a curious look; what brought her out here, anyway? He didn’t miss the step back she took when he looked at her, or the way her eyes widened when she noticed the bruises on his face, the black eye that had swelled and settled on an ugly shade of purple-blue.

He only had a moment to contemplate her before his attention was dragged back to his brother on the other end of the phone.

(He noticed the way her small hand raised, her silent _I understand, you’re busy, I’ll wait_ before she took a step back and even had the decency to look busy for a moment.)

“I’m here,” he snapped back at the phone.

It had been around mid-afternoon when the shitty pay-as-you-go phone he kept on him rang from the inside of his pocket. He glanced at the screen in passing and saw a number he didn’t recognize. They called back twice more, the second time while he was in the barn helping to pack up after the work day was finished.

He shouldn’t have been surprised that it was Merle, and he wasn’t – who else called him, anyway?

“You listening to me?”

“I told you,” Daryl said. “You haven’t even said where you’re are yet.”

“Atlanta,” Merle said. “So you gonna do me a favor and come get me, or will I just not waste my breath giving you the address?”

“I’m comin’ for you,” Daryl snapped. “For fuck’s sake, you talk like I’ve never do anything for you.”

“You haven’t picked up all afternoon. What a waste, that phone of yours is,” he said. 

He gave the address to Daryl, too quickly for his younger brother to do anything with. He had to repeat it another three times until Daryl could repeat it down the phone to him without any additional prompting.

At the front of the stable Beth found herself listening to Daryl. She didn’t know what had happened, but he obviously seemed to be in a hurry. Briefly she considered whether or not it wouldn’t just be best to leave and figure something else out; there was no point troubling someone she barely even knew if she could help it.

“I’ve been at work,” Daryl said sharply. He’d stopped talking for some time while he listened to the other person on the phone. “I’ll be there,” he said, quietly this time. “Give me some time, I’m not driving into the city at rush hour.”

He was nodding at his phone a bit while he paced back and forth, clearly favoring his left side. Every few steps he’d turn and briefly he’d face Beth, nodding his acknowledgement of her presence once or twice as he continued to listen to the other person on the line.

All at once he turned, firmly planting his feet on the ground and facing away from her. She jumped at the sudden movement, quickly backing up several step.

“Do you want to pay for gas, then?” Daryl demanded. “I’ll go get you when I go get you, and you can either deal with it or find your own ride back.

A pause, then, in a low voice: “I’m doing this as a favor to you. Either accept it or don’t – no one made you go out last night.”

“Fine,” he said. He slammed his phone off and shoved it back in his pocket, then kicked the side of the barn and leaned his forearm against the wall in exasperation. All the horses spooked and twisted in their pens, moving back and forth in response to the tension that broke over the barn.

Beth took a moment to calm her pounding heart before shakily turning her attention to the horses and gently cooing them. She couldn’t take her eyes off Daryl, suddenly worried about what else he’d do, but he remained with his forehead resting on the barn wall.

Gradually the horses calmed, and she carefully approached Daryl, unsure what to say to him.

“What do you want?” he asked, breaking the silence as soon as she came within three feet of him.

She hesitated. “You’re Daryl,” she confirmed. “Right?”

“That’s right,” he said. “You’re Beth.”

She nodded. “Yeah,” she said. “I haven’t seen you before.”

Something crossed Daryl’s face. Recognition, perhaps, or contempt. Resentment? Whatever it was, he looked mixed.

Daryl would have called relief, and what came afterwards, he’d call guilt. Yeah, she hadn’t seen him when he dragged Merle off her or when he’d dragged the two of them out of there. He knew who he was, though, and what had happened.

Everything to follow would be built on a lie starting where _I don’t know you’ve been raped_ met _there’s no way what happened to you can be traced back to me_.

“Guess you haven’t,” he vaguely mumbled.

She looked at him curiously, almost as though she was contemplating something. A few times her lips started to move just as her eyes fell to the side, only for her to look at him again and not say anything. He was just about to break the silence and do something when she spoke again.

“You don’t know anyone here, do you?” she asked.

“Just from today and when your daddy interviewed me,” he told.

“Right, right,” she said. They fell into a silence again. She tucked her hands into her pockets for a brief moment. “I need to ask you a favor, if you don’t mind.”

“What is it?”

This was it – the now or never decision to say something that would toe dangerously close to what she didn’t want to verbalize even to herself.

“I need a ride to the pharmacy,” she said. “Preferably one of the one’s that’s not real local. Another town, maybe.” She dug through her back pocket. For a moment she was sure her money had gone missing, but she found it, pulled it out, and handed it to him. “I know it’s a bit of time and it’ll be a bit of a ways for you – I heard you talking – but I’ll pay for gas, and I’ll give you some money too.” She reached her hand out with several notes clenched in her fist. “Can you do that for me?”

He looked at the money and back to her. “Can’t take your cash,” he muttered. “But I’ll take you.”

“I think it’d be better if you took this money,” she said. “Take it for gas, and then keep whatever’s left.”

“I can’t accept money from you,” he told her.

“Why not?” she asked.

Indeed, why not? 

He couldn’t justify taking any money from here. If what she needed from the pharmacy was for anything like what he worried it was for, then it was at least partially his fault she was in this mess. How could he take money to help fix a problem he helped to cause?

Besides, this was why he was here in the first place. He had to make sure she was alright, to keep an eye on her. He was lucky she’d come to him; if there was something he could do to help, he’d do it, and the restless memories from what had happened that night settled now that he had the chance to do right by this girl.

There were all sorts of evils that people did to each other. Daryl had seen it – how could he not? In every group there was always someone who’d had shit happen to them. Sometimes it was a few too many beatings as a kid, or being touched wrong, or anything else that wrecked a body and crept through the crevices of a minds.

It did things to a person. It changed a person. No one he’d see who came from shit was right in the head, but at least with the sorts of people he knew, he could justify it.

Some people were bad from the start, just born wrong.

It was in every swing someone took at him, every swing he took at someone else. There were nights – last night – that left bruises with no cause. There was no reason for that; there never was. For weeks after he’d wear it on his skin and have it reflected back at him by every disgusted person who lay eyes on him. These were the people he ran with, the sort that would leave each other for dead. He wasn’t any better than any of those people.

A few extra beatings as a kid weren’t what put that in someone.

This sort of crap didn’t count all that much when it happened to people like that.

But this girl in front of him was young and she was good. She would’ve been fine if this hadn’t happened to her, and what happened here crossed the line between things he accepted as part of the things that would happen and the sort of things he’d never do.

Beth was innocent – Merle was not.

Neither was he, and even if he spent the rest of his life doing whatever she wanted, it would never make up for how he hadn’t stopped Merle, and how he hadn’t been there sooner.

“I can’t accept your money,” Daryl firmly told her.

“Why?” she demanded again.

“Don’t think your daddy would like it if I took money off you,” he said.

“He’s not going to know,” she insisted. She shook her hand that was holding the money. “Just do me a favor and take it, alright?”

He looked at the money in front of him, then at her. Her hand was shaking but her gaze didn’t waver; she was adamant that he take it.

He took it. “I’ll pay for gas and give you the change,” he muttered. “And yeah, I won’t tell no one either. Don’t gotta worry about that.”

“Thank you.”

“So how are you gonna do this if you don’t want them finding out you got a ride into town?” he asked.

“My mom’s going to a meeting tonight,” Beth told him. “Just wait about half an hour until she goes and you can drive me in. Once we’re done, you can just drop me back off at the end of my driveway. If anyone asks, I’ll just say I was out with my boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend?”

“What are you trying to say?” she asked.

He shook his head. “I’ll bring you,” he said. “Do you wanna go now or should I come back for you in a bit?”

She shrugged. “If you want, you can go do whatever it was you were talking about doing.”

Daryl snorted. “Don’t worry about that,” he said. “I’ll do that later.”

“Thanks,” Beth said. “I guess I’ll go get a few things, and you can just meet me at the mailbox later. Does that sound good?”

Daryl agreed, and headed back off to his bike. For a while longer Beth stayed back in the barn just in case someone was watching. The less anyone saw of her standing around with Daryl, the better.

She thought having the technicalities sorted would be a relief, but it wasn’t. There was still actually going to the pharmacy to take care of, and that would probably be on the back of his bike, which would be a challenge of its own. That still left the question of what she’d do once she got there; even if it was a few towns over, there was always going to be the chance of someone she knew seeing her.

All these worries said nothing about what she’d do once she bought it, or what she’d do when she answered her own question.


	5. Chapter 5

After a light dinner, Annette left to her book club. Beth waited about ten minutes before gathering her wallet and running down to the end of the driveway to wait for Daryl. It was chilly out, the newfound spring warmth from the day not quite reaching the evening. For a few moments she stood there, shivering as the air cooled and the last of her nerves began to creep up on her; she barely knew him, for a start, and had never done anything as daring as this.

( _Remember what happened the last time you snuck out?_ )

Before she had a chance to think on it more, Daryl drove down the highway on his motorcycle and stopped next to her family’s mailbox.

“Ready?” he asked.

She nodded apprehensively and quickly shot a glance over her shoulder. There was no one there to see her go, so at the very least she didn’t have to worry about the technicalities involved with sneaking out. The house was her home, though, and she was about to go very far from her comfort zone.

“Should I just sit behind you?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “Don’t got any helmet for you, if you wanted one. You sure you don’t have any heavier jacket to wear than just… that?”

She looked down at the flimsy cotton jacket she was wearing. Almost subconsciously she pulled it tighter around herself so the blouse she wore underneath was no longer visible. “I guess I can look at my brother’s things,” she suggested. “If you want to come in and wait in the kitchen, I’ll just go find it…”

“I’ll wait in the driveway,” Daryl said. He drove his bike down and waited for her to come back up the driveway and jog into her house.

She had to check through a few of the boxes holding Shawn’s old things before she finally found a heavy denim jacket he’d left when he headed off to college. It was too big on her, and she had to roll the sleeves up, but for what she was planning to do, it would be fine.

Daryl was still waiting outside for her. As she stepped out of the house she it dawned on her again exactly what it was she was doing. There wasn’t another choice, though – out of the frying pan and into the fire. For her own health and peace of mine, she had to do this.

A pregnancy test.

She hadn’t thought she’d be needing one of these until she was older, married, and trying to have kids of her own. She especially hadn’t thought it would be under these circumstances; the possibility that she’d make a mistake one day and just go too far wasn’t outside the realm of possibility.

But not like this. The mistake she’d expected to make had been moving on from kissing too quickly, her boyfriend’s hands up her shirt and her own fussing with her pants. She thought she’d want it, and that her mistake would be something more than going out one night and being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

She shook herself. This wasn’t the time to be thinking about it; it never was, even when the thoughts came. There was nothing to gain from her regrets, and at this point the only thing to do was to go forward.

(Even if she already knew what the results would be.)

At Daryl’s instruction, she climbed on the back of his motorcycle behind him and wrapped her arms around him. With her legs she squeezed the bike and tried to get a better grip, and then they were off.

She’d never thought she’d be riding behind a strange man on a motorcycle. That had always been her sister’s thing, back when she was a teenager, and then, a college student. Maggie was always running off with her friends and other strange guys, and their dad was always riding her back about it. How many fights had they had about how dangerous it was to be on the back of the bike? She could get hurt, on bikes or cars or otherwise. The people she was hanging around were dangerous, and the things that they’d do to her if she continued –

Beth grinned bitterly as Daryl rode the bike on to the end of the road. If anyone had any idea what had happened, they’d be shocked. She’d always been the good girl, never the problem, never the rebel.

She hadn’t been very good that night. She’d had the house for herself and had even given permission to have a few people over. In a rare moment of recklessness, she’d opted to go out with her friends.

That had gone well.

They picked up speed. The wind whipped her hair around her face and stung her eyes. She buried her face in his back and tightly squeezed her arms around his chest. Under his shirt, she could feel the bumps of his ribs and between her arms she felt the movement of his chest as he breathed. She didn’t know how he was able to see anything in the wind, but he was a good driver and everything was fine. In about twenty minutes they were in the next town over.

“Where is it you need to go?” Daryl asked her. His voice was mixed with the gravely sound of his bike and she only caught a few words of it.

Beth stood up on the bike and leaned close to the back of his head so her mouth was inches away from his ear and she could practically taste him.

She told him to go to the pharmacy. He obliged.

“Should I wait out here?” he asked her.

Beth nodded as she dismounted from the bike. “I’ll only be a minute,” she told him. As she walked into the store she brushed her hands over her hair and tried to smooth it down.

The pharmacy wasn’t a big one and it only had a few of the basic things – over the counter pills, some bandages, some make-up, and other basic hygiene products.

Hesitantly she walked down the aisle. She’d been online for a few hours that afternoon looking up different brands to try and decide what would be best to get, but now that she saw them in the aisle she wasn’t sure anymore. She had never felt as lost or as hopelessly confused as she did right then, surrounded by various forms of birth control and different pregnancy tests.

What did she do from there?

“Can I help you?”

Beth whipped around, only to be faced with a young woman who couldn’t be any older than she herself was.

“Um, no, thank you,” she quietly said. “I think I’ve got it.”

The woman looked from Beth to the single shelf of pregnancy tests in front of her. “I’m sure you do, hon,” she said, giving a sickly sweet smile to the young woman in front of her. Beth didn’t miss how her eyes flickered down her body. “If you need anything, just holler. Condoms are right there, if you’re interested.” Having said her part, the clerk turned and walked out of the aisle, shaking her head as she did so.

A dark red flush crept up the back of her neck and she clenched her hands at her side so tight that her nails dug into her palms. It had been the right decision to go to another town; she couldn’t imagine doing something as humiliating as this anywhere near her own house where someone might be able to recognize her.

She knew what this must look like – what else was anyone supposed to think? What happened to her wasn’t the sort of thing that just happened to people, and no one would have thought it would happen to her. She was a teenager, one that looked pretty enough to have a boyfriend and stupid enough to be careless.

Oh, how careless she had been, and now she had to pay for that. It was nothing like what someone must think, though.

With a deep breath she grit her teeth and snatched up one of the pregnancy tests, then stormed to the front of the store and stood in front of the counter. The woman wasn’t behind the counter, and looked surprised to glance over her shoulder and see Beth standing there.

“Is that everything you’ll be needing?” the woman asked as she stepped behind the counter and started to ring up the item.

“That’ll be all,” Beth said. She handed over a ten dollar bill.

“You might want to consider something else, for next time,” the woman drawled while she took the money and counted out Beth’s change.

“With all due respect,” Beth said, “that’s really not your business, and I’d appreciate it if you kept your speculations to yourself.”

The woman’s smile twitched. Beth didn’t look away from until she took her change and pocketed the pregnancy test, and left.

Daryl was still sitting at his motorcycle when she got back to the parking lot. “Did you get what you needed?” he asked.

She nodded and came around the back of his of the bike. “We can go back now, if you don’t mind.”

He didn’t notice any bags on her, but saw the bulge in her pocket. It was small enough to confirm his the suspicion he had about what it was she came for. If it was that, he wasn’t sure what his feelings would be – there would be anger, for a start, along with disgust. How dare Merle do that to this girl; it wasn’t he didn’t give her enough to live with.

(He knew what she had, though. How couldn’t he? To pretend it was anything else would be willful ignorance.)

“If you’re ready,” he said. “Do you need anything else?”

“No,” she said. He didn’t miss how she wiped her face with the sleeve of her jacket before mounting the bike behind Daryl. She gripped the back of his jacket and adjusted her legs until she was sitting comfortably. “Ready.”

Without a word, he drove off.

On the ride back they both pondered the same question: what would the result show?

For Beth, it was a matter of personal concern; the result would either be a relief, or it would be a painful introduction for what would be the next few stressful months. This was the sort of thing that ruined girls’ lives and could ruin her family’s reputation and standing in their community, with both the church and their neighbors. 

She’d have to do something. Whatever she did, her parents would know. There was simply no way around this, as _this_ wasn’t one of the things that could be kept secret. Telling them would be bad enough on its own because they’d ask, and there was only so much bad news she could break to them at once.

Unfortunately, it would all be bad.

The only thing she could hope for was that the test would return negative. It was the last beacon of hope she had to hold on to, and she held on to it.

For Daryl, the question was examined through a veil of mixed feelings. If there was something bad going on he probably wasn’t going to be hearing about it; she had a good family, so why go to him? It occurred to him, briefly that she probably asked him rather than her family because they didn’t know what happened – so far, she’d have been going alone. The thought pissed him off more than it should and he couldn’t put his finger on why, exactly, he was so angry about that.

She’d asked him for help, though. At least he could give her that, and could say he’d done something for her –

( _this time_ )

– and that if she needed anything else from him, he’d have already shown himself to be an asset.

He wanted for what Merle did to not have clung on to her any more than it had to, especially not physically. She sure as hell didn’t need a physical manifestation of what happened that would only cause her more problems and stress.

The thought flitted through his head, briefly, that he could have prevented this.

He gripped the handles tighter and sped back just a little bit faster.

Barely forty minutes passed by the time they arrived back at the Greene’s farm. He pulled up to the end of the driveway and came to a stop right by the mailbox. “Need anything else?” he asked.

Beth checked that her keys and the pregnancy test were still in her pocket. “That’ll be fine,” she said. She reached into her pocket and pulled out the cash. “Thanks for doing this for me.”

“Don’t worry about it,” he said. He kicked the stand back and revved the engine. “Just say if you need anything else.”

They said their goodbyes and with that, he drove away, leaving Beth standing by the side of the road. In the mirror he watched as she turned around and walked back to the house. Then he turned the corner and she was out of his sight.


	6. Chapter 6

As soon as he left, Daryl’s thoughts shifted to his next task. Thoughts of Merle had been creeping at the corner of his mind since the phone call earlier, and now he’d have to do something about it. It was nearing seven now, and Daryl still had to drive into Atlanta and find the address his brother gave him on top of an entire drive back.

He stopped by a gas station to fill the tank, then set off to Atlanta.

The ride in took a while, just as Daryl had expected, and it took longer still to find the address. Most of the road was quiet, and while he enjoyed the easy, peaceful ride, it was easy enough that he could do it entirely on autopilot, and that gave him a chance to think.

He wouldn’t be able to call the day a success until he got Merle back. Even then, whatever small success he had would be minimal. Daryl was glad Beth had asked him to help, and that he’d done something to make her life easier in some way, but what difference did it make? He couldn’t help her. He couldn’t do anything for her. This favor was a tiny part of all the things she needed, and even if she _did_ get that, it wouldn’t make up for what Merle had done.

He was stuck between a wall and an immovable rock, and he’d been the one to put himself there.

By the time he pulled down the old, faded road, it was almost a relief. All he had to do here was grab Merle and get out of there. On the phone Merle had sounded mostly sober, which was good, despite it not telling him much; it was a few hours ago, after all. It was up for debate whether or not he’d heard Daryl beeping his horn from outside the house, although when he was asked later he’d of course say that he didn’t.

By the time Daryl walked up to the house he was exasperated – Merle was the idiot who had gotten himself out here, so he could figure out his own way back.

He hadn’t expected the door to be open, but wasn’t necessarily surprised that it was; it was open about half the time at Tim’s place, and at the end of the day it came down to chance. Stepping inside, he saw that that was where the similarities ended. It was too nice here; the smell of piss and booze and bleach from the failed attempt to lift the other smells was replaced by the scent of old leather, and there were lights on the walls that glowed dimly. The walls were painted rather than bare, and the carpet looked like it was less than thirty years old.

Daryl had time to step into the doorway and glance into the first room at his left before there was a gun in his face.

“Who are you?”

“Woah there,” Daryl said. He took a step back and raised his hands nonetheless.

“I said, _who are you_?” the man snapped.

There were a few seats behind the man ranging from a couch that sat four people, an arm chair, and a few seats that looked like they belonged in either the kitchen or some rich yuppie’s back porch. Various men sat around the room, one of whom was Merle.

“Relax, Len,” Merle said. He leaned forward from his porch chair. “I told you, my brother would be coming. Looks like he finally came through and showed up. You look like quite the mess, don’t you, Daryl? Have fun last night? I was starting to doubt you’d show up at all.”

Len looked back at the man sitting in one of the armchairs, who gave him a nod indicating for him to lower his gun.

“What’s going on here?” Daryl asked. “Merle?”

“Just thought I’d sort out a deal of my own, little brother,” Merle said. “It’s not fair to put all the load on you, now, is it?”

“What sort of deal?” Daryl asked. He glanced between his brother and the other men in the room, specifically at the man in the arm chair. He sat leaning back in his chair, one arm draped across his lap and the other resting on the arm of the chair, a bottle of beer in hand. He noticed Daryl looking, and nodded at him.

“Is your brother going to be with you, Merle?” the man asked.

“He’ll be on board,” Merle said. “He always is, aren’t you, Daryl?”

Merle shot him a _look_ as he said it, with a slack jaw and attentive eyes that focused on his brother like he was a target to shoot at. Where are your vitals, and where will it hurt most to get punched? It was a look they’d shared since they were kids and he needed Daryl to cover for him – or, more usually, to just not rat him out.

_Agree with me_ , that look said, and took the sentiment a step further: _or else_

There was always an _or else_ , and always had been, starting with the back of his dad’s hands and leading up kicks and punches from whoever it was Merle came across – whatever the threat was, it was always lingering there at times like these, and Merle added a threat of his own. _Don’t fuck this up for me, little brother_.

Looking around the room and the men who sat there, Daryl got the impression that the worst that could happen wouldn’t be what Merle dished out for him.

“Of course I’m on board,” Daryl said. There was nothing to lose, and hadn’t been for years. “I won’t be saying nothing, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“In that case, it’s nice to meet you, Daryl,” the man in the armchair said. “It’s a good deal. Favorable for both of us. You too, if you’re interested.”

Daryl shrugged. “Can’t say, if I don’t know what the deal is.”

“Basically, they need some muscle, which I’ve got,” Merle said. “Some help with doing the sorts of things I’m good at, and in return I get some of the things I need.”

“Sounds vague,” Daryl commented.

“It’s a partnership,” Merle said. “Just like any of the other odd jobs we’ve done, ‘cept there’s more in this here than there is in anything else. Probably even better than what you’re doing. What is it you said? Farm work?”

A collective laugh went around the room and Daryl snorted. Nonetheless there was a flush creeping up the back of his neck, indignant and almost angry at the situation. He’d only been signed on a few days but he could already tell that at least the work would be more honest and secure than what Merle managed to secure for himself. He refrained from commenting.

“If you want on board, Daryl, you’d get as much out of this as you put in,” the man in the armchair was saying, continuing on for Merle. “From what I’ve heard about you from your brother, you seem like the sort of man who would suit something like this. You don’t have to take this option, and I wouldn’t think any less of you for that, but just know the choice is still open, for now.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Daryl said. He crossed his arms over his chest and glanced back at Merle. “Merle, you ready to go yet?”

Merle let out a laugh, but stood up and crossed the room to stand next to Daryl, grabbing his jacket along the way. “Looks like my wife here’s being a bit of a nag,” Merle said as he slung an arm around Daryl’s shoulder. Daryl winced where Merle slapped him on the shoulder, and from the grin his brother gave, he knew that he felt it. “That’ll be me, then, boys. Should I expect to be hearing from you soon?” 

“Absolutely,” the man in the armchair said. “We’ll be in touch.”

A few more words were exchanged, but it wasn’t long before Merle was turning Daryl around and giving him a shove towards the door.

“What was that about?” Daryl asked as soon as the door was shut behind them.

“The hell took you so long?” Merle demanded, ignoring Daryl’s question altogether. His fingers were still digging into his younger brother’s shoulder, and whatever strange brand of friendly expression Merle had been wearing in the house was gone, replaced by a glare aimed entirely at Daryl.

“I already told you,” Daryl snapped. He shoved Merle’s arm off of him. “I’m here now, anyway, so the hell does it matter?”

“You sure did take your time,” Merle spat.

“Didn’t look like you had too much of a problem with that, the way you were getting on in there,” he said. “Even managed to get yourself a business deal, didn’t you? I’m sure this’ll be ending real good for you, won’t it?”

“About as well as your little stunt at this farm I was hearing about last night will,” Merle said. “Christ, what’re you thinking, little brother? You think you can get yourself a place out there, that you can leave your old Merle behind and get a step up on me?”

Daryl had to stop for a second, so entirely taken aback by what his brother was saying.

“The hell are you on about?” he finally managed to sputter out. “Ain’t nothing wrong with trying to bring in some cash for myself – for both of us – before we eventually fuck off in a few months.”

“Yeah, and you’re getting a job growing your greens,” Merle said. “Or what was it, again? That or you get to go out and be some kind of cowboy, wasn’t that what you were saying? Some kind of ranch hand, working with cows?”

The parts of his head where memories from last night were meant to be were empty and torn to shreds, with only a few real memories that he could pick on from. He’d had a few too many drinks and remembered knowing he’d regret it the next day (what an impression to make on your first day of work!). A few snippets of conversation were still there, and he could remember bits of what he’d said about his job. The details were shoddy and he couldn’t remember how much it was he’d said, or if it was the cows that had started the fight, but he knew for sure that a fight had been started – his black eye and bruised jaw attested to that, along with the split knuckles he’d been wearing on the back of his hand.

And now he knew, at the back of his thoughts, that giving away where it he was working – and by extension, where Beth lived – was up there with the worst things he could’ve done. He might not have given an address or anything that could definitely track him down, but he could’ve come damn close. The less anyone knew, the better.

Standing in front of Merle, all that seemed like a fleeting afterthought. Mortification was at the front of his mind – what kind of person thought they could get anything out of honest, fair work? The sort that Merle had been ripping on for years: the people who got an honest, fair deal out of life.

They weren’t those sorts of people.

_We’ve only got each other, nothing else_.

“That ain’t some excuse to fuck off like this,” Daryl said in a low, hushed voice. “Whatever you’re thinking, it’s not it. Just giving it a shot, good as any. Don’t reflect nothing on you, or us.”

“Still doesn’t explain why you couldn’t drive out here any earlier for your brother,” Merle said, steering the conversation right back to where it had started.

“You say shit like that, you act like you think I never do shit for you,” Daryl said. “Like I said, didn’t want to be paying for gas at rush hour.”

“You’ve got a job, you should be able to pay for it,” Merle said. “Christ, you stingy little bitch. Never paid for anything to begin with anway.”

“Just shut up, Merle, I’m here now,” he snapped. His patience had been running low for a while now, and it didn’t look like this conversation would be going anywhere soon. “I clean up your mess for you a lot – this included. I didn’t bring you out here and make you stay, but I’m here now, so either get on the back of the bike or just fucking walk. See if I give a damn.”

Merle laughed as he strolled over to the bike. He waved over his shoulder at his little brother. “You coming, then, Daryl?”

Daryl grit his teeth and clenched his fists, but nevertheless he went to the bike and climbed on in front of his brother. All he had to do now was to bring Merle back and he could be done for the day. That was all he needed.

For the whole ride back, Merle’s hands dug into his gut, right on his bruised ribs. He winced at every turn, and while he couldn’t be sure that Merle heard him, he swore for the life of him that his brother held on tighter.


	7. Chapter 7

Her first call was to her sister. She wasn’t sure what she’d say, and with each ring of the phone she wondered if calling wasn’t just a bad idea. What would she say? _Maggie, something bad has happened. Maggie, I need your help. Maggie, I’m pregnant. Maggie, what should I do?_

After five rings, the call went to the voicemail. Instead of leaving a message, Beth hung up and set the phone on her nightstand. She leaned against the headboard and stared down at her knees. Options for how she could go forward rolled around in her head, and they all looked grim and lonely.

She’d have to do something, though. Her thoughts all kept circling around to one simple fact: babies didn’t just disappear.

It felt like a slap to the face. Wasn’t it enough that she was trying to walk off what happened? Would the world not just let her go back to life as she knew it? Already she spent her days strategically doing everything she could do avoid having to think about it. She was doing her damn best to get away from it, even with thoughts of that night bombarding her at every corner.

She was trying to get on with her life, and nothing was letting her do that.

( _Babies won’t disappear if you ignore them._ )

Finally, when the weight of her thoughts became too much, Beth grabbed the phone and impulsively dialed Jimmy’s number. Again, she wasn’t sure what she’d say, but it didn’t matter – it was too much to think about what she’d do now, and she needed a distraction.

Unlike Maggie, Jimmy answered. Beth tried not to fault Maggie for that, although the resentment was there.

It was nice to know Jimmy was just down the line, though.

“Hey, Beth,” he said. His words were reserved, and there were far fewer than she’d expected. “I haven’t heard from you in a while.”

“That’s true,” she agreed. Already she could feel a heavy knot in her stomach begin to form as emories of the last time she saw Jimmy came flooding back. They hadn’t talked since Wednesday night apart from at school, and they didn’t have the privacy there to talk about what happened. She hadn’t even realized it had been that long ago, even if that night did seem a lifetime away.

It was her own fault for not addressing it sooner; even if she did stay home sick the next day, she should’ve at least called, and failing to do that, she should’ve said something when she did see him again. There really wasn’t any excuse.

“So, how are you doing?” she asked. Pitiful.

“Me? I should be the one asking you,” he said. “Are you all right?”

She wasn’t sure how to answer that question. What even counted as being all right anymore?

“If I’m honest,” she said, choosing her words carefully, “there’s been a lot going on recently.”

“I’ve noticed,” Jimmy replied. His words were short, and she wondered how careful he was being about what he said. “You’ve been distant lately.”

“I—” She stopped herself before she could make the same tried, tired excuses. “I suppose I have been.”

“Well?” he asked. “Is that all you’re going to say about it?”

“I don’t know what you want me to say,” she said. “I don’t have an excuse. I’ve been distant, and distracted, and I guess I haven’t been that great of a girlfriend recently.”

He sighed, but didn’t say anything. Perhaps trying to navigate this land mine of a conversation was as nerve wracking for him as she was finding it. There was a lot to say, and a lot that could be said, and Beth would do anything to avoid digging too deeply into this. She wanted it to be over, and she wanted to just talk to Jimmy, but he felt distant, like there was more than just a phone between them.

“You’re not a bad girlfriend,” he finally said. “If that’s what you’re worried about.”

“Well, I’m glad you don’t think so,” she said.

“Did I do something wrong, Beth?” he asked. Pleaded. He wanted answers, most of them being ones she wasn’t ready to give him.

“You didn’t,” she said. “I promise. You haven’t done anything wrong.”

“‘It’s not you, it’s me,’ right?” he asked. His voice taunting, his words mocking. “Is that why you called, Beth?”

“It’s not like that.”

“Then what _is_ it like?” he demanded. There was an edge to his voice and she could hear it, along with how his words shook as he said them.

He took a breath, and in a lower, calmer voice, said, “I know you’ve been going through a lot recently, and I want you to be happy. But Beth, I really don’t know where that leaves us.”

“Where it leaves us?” she echoed. “Do you think I’m trying to break up with you?”

He was quiet for a while long. A knot was forming in her throat, and she wondered if she could say anything to him. She couldn’t explain this; it would be wrong to tell him something so _horrible_ , even if it might help him understand the _why_. How could she lay something like this on him, and give him the responsibility of knowing something she was usually too afraid to even acknowledge herself? It wasn’t fair. It shouldn’t have happened to her, and she wished that it had never happened, but she wouldn’t go crawling to Jimmy; what right did she have to force this on him?

“I’m worried you might be,” he said. “Or that you want to. If you do, I understand. It’s just high school, right?” He let out a short, bitter laugh.

“I’m not breaking up with you,” she said. “Put your mind at ease. I’m _not_ breaking up with you. That’s not why I called you tonight at all.”

“Was there a reason you called?”

“I wanted to talk to you. I’ve missed you, a lot.” She rolled onto her side pulled her knees up to her chest, tucking her free arm under her head. Her light was on, and as far as she knew she was the only person awake in the house. “If it would just be awkward now, I understand.”

“Oh, no!” he said. “I’ve missed you, too.”

Beth smiled into her pillow as she lay there. It was nice to talk to him again, regardless of how strained the conversation had been so far. With everything else, their constant texting had ceased. He wasn’t around to visit her much anymore. Even in school, they weren’t as close. She hadn’t noticed it before, being so caught up in herself, but it was something she’d missed, and that she wanted back.

For a while, at least, her other thoughts ceased, and she was only Beth Greene, a girl lying in bed, talking to her boyfriend. Everything else was distant, if only for a moment, and she didn’t want to hang up until her words were sticking on her lips and refused to come out anymore, and she was already in the process of drifting off to sleep.

\--

In the morning, two things hit her like concrete: her mom pounding on her door, yelling for her to get up, and a flash of a memory from the night before – she was still pregnant, after all, regardless of what she’d done about it.

“I can’t believe you overslept,” Annette said as Beth hurried through the motions of getting ready. It was creeping up to eight, and her bus would be there any minute. “I don’t want to have to drive you today, but it’s looking like I’m not going to have much choice, am I?”

“I know, I know,” Beth said. She brushed a layer of foundation over her cheeks and made quick, dark lines above her eyes with liquid eye gel. Her lip gloss and phone were quickly pocketed, and she shoved everything she needed into her schoolbag before she ran out the door, leaving no time to think about anything else

Annette was standing at the bottom of the stairs, arms crossed as she waited for Beth to come downstairs. “You really are pushing your luck, young lady,” she said with a harsh tone. “We’re going to have to talk about this.”

“Not now,” Beth snapped as she tore through the house. “I’m going to try to catch the bus before I make you drive me all the way into town.”

With that, she was out the door. She sprinted down the driveway out towards the mailbox, passing a few of the farm hands as they began driving themselves into town. Daryl was there, and as she jogged down to the street she gave him a tightlipped smile and a nod, which he returned.

She managed to make it to the bus stop with less than a minute to spare, and spent the remainder of the ride into town trying to catch her breath.

After the talk last night, it was nice to see Jimmy again. She let him take her hand and walk her to class, where he kissed her sweetly before sprinting to make it to his own homeroom before the bell rang. During lunch they sat together as they usually did, and she even took the initiative to let him wrap his arm around her.

It was a small break in the storm of her thoughts. During class she was distracted and could only absentmindedly jot down a few notes in between scribbling in the margins, and most of her in-class work was left unfinished. Every effort she made to focus always found her with her thoughts returned to the subject she’d been pondering since the night before – what was she meant to do now?

Once school was finally over, she walked back to the bus and waited to go home. It was only when she was just getting off the bus that she thought to turn her phone back on that she realized she had two missed calls from Maggie during the day.

It took two rings for Maggie to pick up.

“I realized missed your call last night,” she said. “Hopefully it wasn’t anything urgent.”

“It wasn’t urgent,” Beth said. “Besides, it was at a late time, anyway. I guess I wasn’t thinking.” She laughed a bit.

“I’ve just been so busy lately; it didn’t take much before I crashed.”

“What were you doing?”

“The same as usual,” Maggie answered. “Show season’s starting up soon, so I’ve been busy with that, along with getting ready for the move, and planning for the wedding. It’s been pretty stressful.”

“Yeah,” Beth said. “You’ve got a lot on your plate, haven’t you?”

“I’m glad I decided not to do any competitions this year,” Maggie went on. “Could you imagine if I was juggling all of this with that, as well?”

Beth cracked a grin as she walked into the house. There was no one downstairs, so she slid her shoes off and marched herself up to her room. “I’m glad it’s working out for you,” she said. “When are you coming back?”

“Probably at the end of the month, when Shawn’s back over spring break,” Maggie said. “I’ll be back over Easter, too, of course, and then I’ll be moving back for the summer, until Glenn and I move into our house.”

“I’m glad,” Beth said. “I’ve missed having you in the area.”

“It’ll be nice to live closer to home again,” Maggie agreed. “It’s nice out here, but you know. Home is where the heart is, isn’t it?”

Beth agreed, and listened to Maggie talk for a while long as she began to unpack her schoolbag and turn on her laptop.

“Was there any reason you called, by the way?” Maggie asked. “Last night, I mean.”

Beth stopped what she was doing and dangled her legs over the edge of the mattress. Just like last night, she was starting to have second thoughts about whether or not she was ready to say anything, and what there even was to say. All her problems were tied up in each other, and she wasn’t sure where to begin, or if revealing bits of information wouldn’t lead to Maggie unraveling everything.

“I’ve had some problems recently,” she settled on saying and waited to see what Maggie’s reaction was. She picked at the top of the blanket with her fingers, rubbing the fabrics on her quilt against each other.

“What’s wrong?” Maggie asked.

“I’m pregnant,” she blurted out. She slammed her teeth together and sealed her lips shut. This was as far away from being subtle as she could get, and now that fact hung out in the open.

“Oh,” Maggie said simply.

“Oh?” Beth repeated. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I mean – I’m surprised, really,” Maggie said. “And here I am talking your ear off about moving companies. Are you all right?”

“Do you think there’s something wrong with me?” Beth hurriedly asked. “Because of that?”

“It’s not good,” Maggie settled on. “I don’t think that’s a problem with you, though. Have you told anyone else?”

“No, I haven’t,” she said. “And don’t you dare tell Daddy, or Mom.”

“I won’t,” she promised. “Will you?”

Beth thought for a moment, trying to think of a good answer for that. During the pause, Maggie pressed onwards, “You’re going to have to, eventually. If you’re going to keep the baby, you’ll have to tell them soon.”

“If I’m going to – are you suggesting what I think you are?” she asked, shocked by what her sister was implying. There wasn’t anything wrong with that, but it wasn’t never a possibility she would have even considered, ever, especially not for herself.

“I’m not suggesting anything,” Maggie said.

They both fell into silence as the weight of the conversation slowly dawned over each of them. Beth wasn’t sure if it was preferable than having the secret locked up in her chest with only herself to tend to it. At least it wasn’t spread around the room like a miasma. At least it had been hers to do with as she pleased. And now her sister knew.

“You can’t say anything to anyone,” Beth repeated. “ _No one._ ”

“I won’t,” Maggie promised again. “I promise, this’ll just stay between us.”

“I don’t know what I’m going to do about this,” she said. “I just found out yesterday. Last night, actually.”

“Does Jimmy know?”

“Why would—” Beth began to ask, then stopped herself before she could finish the sentence.

“It’s his, right?”

“Yes,” Beth lied. It felt bitter in her mouth.

“Are you going to tell him?”

“Probably,” she said. Another lie; he could never know.

“I’ll help you,” Maggie said. “Whatever you need, I’ll help. If you want, I’ll help you tell Mom and Daddy when I visit over spring break. Or I can talk to them first, if you want. Whatever you need, Beth.”

“What would they say?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “But it doesn’t matter, all right? It will work out, though. All right? We’ll all love you, whatever you decide.”

“I don’t even know what I want to do from here,” she confessed. All options sounded terrible, even if she had the comfort of Maggie’s support.

And she knew if she told Maggie what happened, all of it, Maggie would still support her, whatever that would mean. But that didn’t mean it was fair to put that responsibility on Maggie. Already she was asking too much of everyone. Maggie already had her wedding to plan, and she was undoubtedly worried about moving in with Glenn, and now, on top of all that, she was going to spend the next few weeks worried about her baby sister, the idiot who got in over her head and needed someone to hold her hand through whatever came next.

Maggie didn’t need that. Beth didn’t, either, but it’s not like it mattered what she needed or wanted in this situation.

(That was why it happened, after all – someone didn’t take what she needed into account.)

“Think about what you want,” Maggie said. “And you know, whatever it is, Daddy will still love you. So will Mom, and so will Shawn, and so will I. You know that, right?”

“I know,” Beth said. Her mouth felt dry. “Thank you.”

She could never tell Maggie the whole thing. She couldn’t tell anyone, ever, but especially not now. There was too much out in the open already, even if it was to just one person, and that was already messing up everyone’s life.

It was a mistake telling Maggie this much, and she regretted saying anything before she even hung up the phone.


	8. Chapter 8

She had until the end of March before she’d see Maggie again, and it was just dipping into the second week of the month. Regardless of what it was, something would happen; it had to. Just the knowledge that waiting for Maggie would bring her nearly two weeks closer to _something_ made her sick with worry, and Beth almost didn’t want to get up the next morning, instead wanting to stay out of the way and let life move on without her.

The next day she woke up in a daze. She walked to school. The whole day was a blur, with her attention focused entirely on a bigger issue. When it was finally over, she decided that it couldn’t have ended soon enough; she practically ran out of school to catch her bus, and by the time she got home she was ready to act as if nothing had happened that day, that it had been normal and her thoughts hadn’t taken off without her.

She hadn’t been sure what she’d expected from telling Maggie. It was out there now, and even though what she’d said on the phone had only been a tiny part of what had really happened, just the tip of the iceberg, she couldn’t shake the feeling that it was common knowledge now, for everything. Neither of her parents had said anything to her that morning, but they knew; they had to. She’d said it to someone, and now it was too late to take her secret back. It wasn’t hers anymore.

But of course no one knew; Maggie was good to her, and wouldn’t have shared such a personal secret with anyone. Maybe she’d have told Glenn, her fiancé, but Beth had known him for a few years now, and he was a decent enough man that Beth knew wouldn’t talk about this. It didn’t do much to calm her nerves, or to make her feel any better.

It was a few days more before she next saw Daryl, and when she did she wasn’t sure what to say to him. There had only been a handful of times that she’d even seen him, usually while he was at work, and apart from the favor she’d asked, she’d never bothered talking to him or getting to know him.

To her surprise, he came to her that Friday evening while she was sitting outside, taking advantage of the longer days as she watched the sun set across the fields.

“Can I help you?” Beth asked. Her words were stiff and polite, and she tried to put on a friendly tone, suddenly unsure what to say to him.

“I just wanted to see how you were doing,” he said. He glanced down at her, and subconsciously she folded her arms around herself and leaned over her legs.

“I’m alright,” she said, but hesitated as she said it.

Daryl nodded and looked away for a moment. He glanced over his shoulder and noticed Otis walking towards the house. Neither of them said anything until he approached, when Daryl shuffled out of his way and Beth squeezed herself smaller on the stairs. The look he gave Daryl brought him back to himself, and all at once he was reminded of where he was and what it must look like.

He gave Otis a nod that was left unreturned, and only once Otis was up the stairs and on his way into the house did he look back at Beth.

“I know there’s something,” He stopped for a moment. Too up front. Beth looked at him with a tilt to her head and her lips firmly pressed together.

“Something,” she repeated.

What she’d wanted was for Daryl to give her a lift to the pharmacy and for their interactions to be left at that. It was why she’d asked him, someone she barely even knew: to avoid questions, and this conversation all together.

“Beth, are you really alright?” he asked.

She shrugged and dropped her gaze down to her hands, feeling the regret at having asked for his help in the first place, and yet also feeling a glimmer of relief that someone was asking. He didn’t know her, nor did he know anything about her situation, and yet he was concerned. 

“I know something’s wrong,” he went on. “I just wanted to ask you if – about last week – is it all right?”

She nodded, then shook her head. This wasn’t what she wanted. She didn’t want to say anything to the people she loved, much less a stranger. There wasn’t any sort of good option, so what was she to do?

“Are you?” he asked. There was a hint of anger in her voice and she recoiled, her body tensing as she looked up to see him standing in front of her, looking down at her with his startling blue eyes.

“I’m,” she began, but stopped. What was she?

“You don’t have to say if you don’t want,” he quietly told her. “Just figured I’d ask.”

“Do you care, or are you just curious?” she asked. “Do you just want some gossip about—”

“I was wondering,” he interrupted. “I’m worried. You’re too young to deal with this shit.”

“‘This shit,’” she echoed. “You don’t know what you’re talking about, do you?”

He did know, but once again didn’t say anything. It was a thought that regularly made an appearance at the front of his mind, something he could only acknowledge with horror and revulsions. Being young sucked, and being young and fucked up sucked even worse. Here she was, going through that, and that was just wrong.

“I know you’re going through a bad time,” he said quietly. “You’re doing it by yourself, too.”

She glared at him incredulously, and he couldn’t blame her. He had no right expecting her to trust him or take his word on anything, but if there was anything he could do to help her now, he wanted to do it. He at least owed her that.

“What do you think happened to me?” she asked, unsure for a moment whether she was referring to the pregnancy or the rape. She’d never seen Daryl before in her life, but he was worried. He was concerned, and talking to her like he had something to say, and like he knew something was up.

“You wound up getting in over your head,” Daryl said. “Now you’re in a pretty bad place. It ain’t your fault, but you don’t know what to do now. You’re worried about it, and you probably need help, even if you don’t wanna ask. I can’t guess the specific, but that’s the general idea, isn’t it?”

Beth snorted, then glanced away. Everything he said was right, and probably rang more true than it would have had he outright said that she’d been raped and was pregnant. He knew about the pregnancy, though, she was sure of that.

How obvious was it? She’d worried from the start that it would be, and that everyone would know even without her saying anything. Apart from her missing period, there wasn’t any proof; she’d measured and weighed herself, and while a few pounds had added themselves onto her skinny frame, there wasn’t anything that would make someone stop in the street and point to her, knowing she was pregnant, that she’d been raped. What if there was just something about her that changed her so much that everyone could see it, even if she’d never breathed a word to anyone? 

She told Maggie. That had been a mistake. Now she wondered if it had even made a difference. Did it matter whether or not she said anything, or was she so painfully transparent that it was written on her skin?

( _Soon her body would be singing from the weight of it, and everyone would hear_.)

“I’ve told my sister,” she said quietly.

“Maggie?” Daryl asked as he tried to recall what Herschel had said his kids’ names were.

Beth nodded before hesitantly looking up at him. “We haven’t talked about it much more than that,” she said. “That must sound so _stupid_ , doesn’t it?”

Daryl shrugged. “Doesn’t sound stupid to me,” he said. “It’s not really any of my business.”

“You really aren’t here for gossip,” she slowly said. “Or maybe you are.” She laughed a bit. God. There wasn’t any way for her to tell. 

“Don’t got no one to be gossiping to,” he said. “Man, what would I even get out of telling your secrets to everyone? No one gives a shit about that thing anyway, and your daddy would just be telling me to get lost.”

Beth shrugged. “You know what happened,” she said. “At least, you think you do.”

“It ain’t something nice,” he said. “It ain’t good. You know that. Don’t wanna see anyone else put through that.”

She looked up incredulously at him. _Anyone else_. Just as she was going to comment on his word choice, Otis came out and stepped around her.

“Hey Beth,” he said to her. “Your mom says dinner’s going to be ready soon, so you ought to go in and wash yourself up.” He winked at her and nodded at Daryl, clapping him lightly on the shoulder. The two man exchanged an incredulous glance that matched the look they’d shared earlier, and Otis’ eyes flickered down to where Beth was sitting, almost as a warning. Daryl nodded politely. He knew what the other man was thinking, even if it couldn’t be more wrong.

He watched Otis leave and get down to his car before he turned back to Beth. “Looks like that’s my invitation to leave,” Daryl murmured as he dug through his pockets to look for something. Eventually he found an old, faded receipt that he’d been carrying with him. He pulled it out and continued digging for something he could write with, but predictably, there was nothing.

“What are you doing?” Beth asked.

“Looking for a pen,” he muttered.

Beth grabbed one from her purse and offered it up to him. It was a bit too shiny for his taste, but it was more than anything he had. He couldn’t remember ever writing with a gel pen in his life, and it was weird to look at how it came out on the paper as he scrawled something down against the rails of the porch.

She watched him as he did it, unsure what he was doing, but having a guess. Sure enough, when he handed the paper down to her, her suspicions were confirmed.

“Why are you giving this to me?” she asked.

“Give me a call sometime,” he said. “Don’t text or nothing, since my phone’s too crap for that.” He pulled it out of his pocket to show her – it was just an old model that probably wasn’t even sold anymore.

“Why, though?” she insisted. “What do you even want?”

“I want to help you,” he said. He was forceful with his words and as insistent as he could be. Whether or not it did any good was a different matter; he knew this probably wasn’t a time when being more forceful was helpful, but he wasn’t sure what to say to convince him of her sincerity when he hadn’t cared if anyone found him to be sincere in years.

She took the paper, and didn’t ask any questions. Whether or not she’d call was a different matter, one that he couldn’t predict.

“I need to go in for dinner,” she said to him as she stood and picked up her things to take inside with her. She glanced over her shoulder as she reached the door, tucking the paper in the breast pocket of her blouse and watching as he walked away.

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from "Pigs That Ran Straightaway into the Water, Triumph of" by The Mountain Goats.


End file.
